Thoughts on the Random Select Winter Showdown in PDX

I believe this was the first major tournament in the northwest since the one at Famcom in Redmond a few years ago. I will not lie, I was very excited to be in attendance. I had originally intended to enter every single game available, but the majority of my caravan played only Super Turbo or Marvel. That was fine with me, because those are the only games that matter anyway. I managed to enter Marvel, ST, KOFXI, third strike, and Guilty Gear. Marvel only had 11 people enter, so the match ups were nasty but it was still fun. Unfortunately I did not place. I went 0-2 in GG, but I actually put up a fight in the game. That is impressive to say the least seeing as how I only played the game two times after the US release for ps2 came out. Third Strike was nasty like usual. I went 1-3 in that game using Hugo, and I managed to beat a decent Chun player. I was finally eliminated by an Alex player, so that match was epic and I enjoyed it very much. I also entered the KOFXI tournament, but I choked big time. Mostly because I forgot all of the moves and combos I had practiced. There were about 15 or so Mexicans playing all sorts of SNK games, so that was cool to see in person for once.

The real highlight was how I did in ST. I love the game, but I sure as hell never practice anything. I only play it at gatherings, because the game is tons of fun against good competition. I play Ryu, purely on instinct. I have tried watching good Ryu match videos from Japan and whatnot, but I do not see anything that I would want to emulate. My style is pure courage and heart. I will attempt things that no one should ever try. I will walk forward a quarter of the playing space and do walk up throws in your face. I have no fear. I use him because he is very basic, yet versatile.

On to the actual ST tournament. I managed to get 3rd place and won $22. FUCKING AWESOME. To be fair, I don’t think I was matched up against extremely good players, but I can adapt fairly well. Being that Marvel is my main game, ST comes across as an extremely slow game for me. My first match was against some Mexican guy using Guile. This match up scares me, because despite whatever some jap overseas thinks about this match up it is a huge pain in the ass for Ryu. Sure, I can spam fireballs, but if Guile gets close I will be eating spinning back fists all day. A good Guile just turtles and constantly keeps charge for sonic booms or flash kicks. Thankfully, I have played against the best Guile in the NW, so this Mexican Guile guy was no where near as effective as Axel Kelly. He placed 2nd overall. I was a cheap bastard because I spammed fireballs from a distance and baited him into throwing sonic booms so that I could hurricane kick over them and do damage via throws.

The second guy I fought was actually a WA Ken player. He actually beat me one game because I did not take him seriously, but he was also on top of his game. I had never seen him be that effective so props to Paul for holding it down. He learned the knee bash trap well.

The third guy I fought was none other than what seems to be my ST arch rival, Julius Blaze. Before people started playing this game for real in Seattle, Julian was tearing shit up the first season of the ST tournaments. He plays Balrog, one that can be scary if you are not careful. Of course, that goes for all boxer players. I think I had only played him once in an actual tourney, and I lost. Ever since then I never really played him for real. Since I never really place that high in Seattle ST tournaments, I believe he underestimated just how much I can beast on people. I like fighting boxer, because I can see all his moves in advance. I can stuff most of his attacks with crouching forward and roundhouse. I also like throwing out dragon punches a full screen away because they stuff his attacks as well and help me build meter. We went the distance, and I believe I was able to greatly reduce the effectiveness of his attacks, and that is why I won. Again, it shows the brilliance of ST as a game. Play your cards right with any character and you can overcome any disadvantages your character may have in certain match ups. It was glorious.

After that I made it to the winner’s finals. I fought Julien Beasley, who played Bison. I seriously thought I could beat him because I have fought him before with my Ryu and beaten him soundly with my unorthodox style. However, Beasley was not fucking around this time, and hit me with tons of tick throws and dizzy combos. He is truly a master of the game and it was an honor to even be matched up against him. Then I played Axel Kelly in loser’s and lost to his Guile. I ate many a back fist and flash kicks. It was similar to the Hatton vs. Mayweather fight. I kept myself busy by continuously going forward, but he pulled out a few “Pretty boy Floyd” shots on reaction and killed me.

Hopefully we can get something like this going here in Seattle. Our Marvel crew is probably the best in the nation, and our ST players can hang with the best of them. Overall I was satisfied with how smoothly everything went. I left Seattle around 12pm that Saturday and arrived around 5am Sunday morning. It was a blast, and I have not had that much fun with regards to gaming since Evo. I drove down 3 hours, placed in ST and drove back that same night. I am pretty awesome.

Here are two pictures with me in them:

You can see Keith, me, Dan, and Brian Ma signing up to kick some ass. Yes, that is my “serious but still sexy” face. Sam Y. is that guy with the curly hair, he is savage at 3S and CVS2 and he helped run the actual tournament.

As you can see great minds think alike. We wore the exact same color scheme, something that has never happened before. I thought I was the only one who rocked Halloween colors year round. Top row is my good looking ass, Sir Julius Beasley who got 1st place, Keith the dirtiest player in the game. Bottom row is Nate “Gief Jr.” Montes and Axel “Hardbody” Kelly who rocked cats left and right and got 2nd place.

You won on the deciding round by less than THIS much >]]]]< life, I STILL ask myself why I failed to block that jumpkick I saw comming from a mile away that you ghetto-comboed into cr. roundhouse. But GGs and funny writeup of the best tourney EVA.